The invention relates to safety devices and safety methods and in particular to safety devices for use in the medical profession. Specifically, it relates to safety devices and safety methods for medical solution administration systems.
In the prior art, numerous methods of clamping medical solution lines have been used. Some have merely been common pinch type clamps, other have had the capability of providing a partial clamping action to control the solution flow (varying from full flow to complete cut-off), None of these clamps have had any safety device connected with the clamp.
The present invention is designed to provide a device and method to assure safety in medical solution administration system for continuous intravenous therapy. From time to time there have been reported instances of near catastrophes in the administration of medical solutions.
Most present day clamps operate somewhat similarly. A wheel or roller-like element of the structure is moved by a finger or thumb of the operator up and down an inclined plane in order to wedge or squeeze a small tube. This squeezing compresses the tubing as the roller moves downward on the inclined plane and decompresses the tubing as the roller moves upward on the inclined plane. At various points between fully closed and fully open, the tubing has a relative graduated opening for adjusted flow. In other clamps, a roller operating on a more or less straight track merely closes or opens the passageway in the tubing. The roller may have short axle-like projections on each side and operate in track-like slots.
In any event, these clamp devices are subject to operation without any safety device to interrupt the operator or face the operator to take deliberate action to operate the clamp. Thus, in a plurality of medical solution administration lines to a patient, or even just a single such line to a patient, a medical attendant has no deterring force to cause the attendant to observe what line is selected or what adjustment is made. Merely reaching out and making an adjustment to a line could prove disastrous, perhaps fatal.
In the present invention the medical attendant is forced to deliberately remove the safety flap or cover and in so doing has the opportunity to observe the label on the line selected. Thus, a margin of safety is injected into the operation of the medical solution administration system.
The clamps are usually inserted on the tubing between the drip chamber from the medical solution supply and the injection structure at the injection site on the patient.
It is therefore an object of the invention to provide a method to induce safety into the routine of medical attention to the operation of medical solution administration systems.
It is another object of the invention to provide a safety device to force deliberate action by a medical attendant in operating a medical solution administration system.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a safety device to force deliberate attention by a medical attendant in selecting a medical solution line for ajustment in a medical solution administration system.
It is yet another object of the invention to provide a safety device that can be secured in place on the clamp structure of the medical solution administration system.
Further objects and advantages of the invention will become more apparent in light of the following description of the preferred embodiments.